Fila Shoot with Boone Speed and Alex Puccio

This past June I assisted Portland-based photographer Boone Speed with a photo shoot in NYC for FILA. Boone’s not just a super talented artist and an all-around inspiring guy. He used to be a Fila-sponsored climber back in the day, which made the shoot – featuring the company’s newest athlete, pro climber Alex Puccio – that much more fitting. And Boone definitely knows how to shoot climbing, even in NYC.

Boone Speed shooting in NYC for Fila. Photo by Caroline Treadway.

We hit the city during the first hot week in June and spent two days searching for climbable, graphic spots, from Central Park to the southwest tip of Manhattan, where Alex could huck dynos in Fila flair and scramble up rocks in the new Skeletoes. We had a four to ten person crew at all times, hair and make-up, Boone’s agent Robin, John Lin from Fila and a bunch of other talented, creative and awesome people. It’s always good to see commercial interest in rock climbing from outside the industry.

Alex Puccio getting hair and make-up, photo by Caroline Treadway.

Boone’s a pretty independent photographer. He shoots a subject when he sees it, intuitively and fast. I admire that kind of free form minimalism, a lot, but it also gave me time to and hang with Alex and bond with the crew, who were all psyched to ditch the office and work outside for two days.

Boone at work in NYC, photo by Caroline Treadway.

A couple of really cool things happened on the Fila shoot. One, we got to show our permits to lots of park rangers. I’ve honestly never seen so many rangers in one hour. Two, we met the president of Fila, Chairman Yoon from Korea, which was very formal, a little intimidating and involved a lot of press.

It always amazes me how shoots come together – the chemistry, the psyche, the hard work, somehow it all gels into something that becomes creative and marketable. I think the success of a shoot depends on the success of the entire team working together. It’s awesome how well you get to know people in just two days of creative collaboration.

John Lin Alex Puccio during a lunch break. Photo by Caroline Treadway.

After the shoot Boone and I soaked in the city at Flavor Paper in Brooklyn. Here are some random photos from the last few hours in New York.

The Hudson River, photo by Caroline Treadway.

Statue of Liberty, photo by Caroline Treadway.

A little apres-shoot Ransom at Flavor Paper in Brooklyn, photo by Caroline Treadway.